Owen Goes to Heaven

My little boy Owen. My Oh-e Bear. By far the sweetest dog I have ever had.

He is in doggie heaven now.

I’ve only ever lost one dog before—Riley. He was my best friend. His death was sudden, and I didn’t have to make any hard decisions. That wasn’t the case with my sweet Owen. My little shadow.

He got sick again. He was throwing up and not eating. Unfortunately, I knew what this likely meant, and I wasn’t wrong. He had eaten something and, once again, had an obstruction in his bowels that he was unable to pass on his own. Without the help of surgery, he wasn’t going to make it. His fifth surgery since May 2020.

Sunday night he was miserable. It was almost as if he had given up. He just stared off into space. I went out to my mother’s and retrieved some dog pain medication to administer to him. I had pretty much accepted that it was possibly his time to go to heaven.

Monday morning, he had some pep back in him. The pain medication seemed to have worked. He did his little dance and raced down the hall to go outside. I was not expecting this. Like I said, I had concluded that come Monday morning I would take him into the vet and likely have him put to sleep. This sudden reversal left me feeling lost. I was not going to bring my boy to be “put down” if he was still showing a will to live. He still wouldn’t eat, though, and it had been three days since he had kept anything down.

I wasn’t really worried about him getting into anything, so I let him have free rein of the house that morning when I went to work.

I was conflicted that morning. My plans changed. I was going to see how he felt at lunch, and if he wasn’t well, I would take him to the vet that afternoon. It was a long-ass morning, and I was sick to my stomach with anxiety. When I went home for lunch, he greeted me at the door and did his little dance—the dance I will always remember. I was feeling a little optimistic. Maybe he would get through this. I decided to see how he was that evening. Just maybe he would eat. I gave him some more pain medication and went back to work.

God, it was a long fucking Monday.

That evening he still would not eat. I tried rice, pumpkin, and wet food—everything I could think of—with no luck. I knew at that moment that I had to take him to the vet again, if for no other reason than to rule out other causes for the lack of appetite. That night, while everyone else was in bed, I lay down with him and pet him and told him how good a boy he was. I cried with him, my tears dampening his coat. It would be the last time I got to lie down with him.

Tuesday morning, I made an appointment for him for that afternoon. I gave him love and some more pain meds and left for work. I let him once again have free rein over the house. If this was to be his last day, I figured it was only fair.

When I got off work to take him to the vet, the sweet boy got excited when I brought the leash out. He started wagging his tail like nothing was wrong. I loaded him up in the vehicle and rolled the windows down. He stuck his head out, raised his nose to the air, closed his eyes, and smiled, all the while wagging his tail. It would be his last ride, and it was glorious. It was what he loved. That is the image I will carry of him forever in my mind: a dog without a worry in the world, just on a drive with his father on a beautiful afternoon.

He did indeed have a blockage, and he had lost more weight. He was down to 46 pounds. That’s incredible. I wanted to fight for him. Seeing him enjoy the ride gave me no choice. Unfortunately, he was beyond help. When they began the surgery, I was optimistic, but what they found was inoperable.

My heart broke.

I broke.

Saying goodbye to him was one of the hardest things that I have had to do. He was supposed to outlive our other dogs and be the one that gave me strength when Hazel eventually passes away. He was only seven years old, and it shouldn’t have been his time yet. God, I cried. I am still crying. My house feels so empty.

The grief is very real. He was my little shadow who followed me wherever I went. He was there to comfort me when I was down and not feeling well. All he wanted was love.

I didn’t want him at first. My ex-wife insisted upon getting another dog once we moved into a bigger house, and Owen was what she found—this little bitty black lab. I was immediately in love with him, even when I gave her shit about him being her dog whenever he got into my shit. He was always renowned for getting into shit. I don’t even know how many of my sandals and flip-flops that dog chewed up. He might have been her dog, but he became my dog. I fought hard to keep Owen in my life and not separate him from Hazel.

I know he wasn’t the perfect dog. God bless, he angered me plenty by getting into shit. I have no idea how many times I had a mess to clean up after him. The worst was the baby formula all over the kitchen. That was like glue on the floor and took me over thirty minutes to clean. Then there were the numerous items he destroyed that belonged to my family, one being my wife’s purse. At one point, I worried Yvette might leave me because of him.

We had to learn not to leave anything out that he might be able to get into. He would find a way. That boy could stretch himself onto the counter, and he knew how to open the cabinets if they were not properly closed. The bottomless pit. His lack of control. Eventually, for our own peace of mind and his safety, I kept him closed up in my office during the times we were not home. He just couldn’t help himself, though. I know this.

Getting into shit would end up being the death of him.

For all his faults, I loved him deeply. He was just a puppy at heart. He never grew up. He was just a gifted, goofy dog. He had the most innocent eyes—eyes that exuded love.

Sweet Oh-e wouldn’t let me out of his sight if he could help it. After I hit my head, that dog was there for me every step that I took. It was the weirdest thing. I was forced to take a month off work to recover, and that dog was always by my side. He knew I needed him. That is one of the reasons I could not give up on him without trying. He was there for me in some of my worst moments.

He had a howl that was unlike any sound I have ever heard a lab make. I know labs. It was like a hound dog. I’m sure some neighbors probably thought at first that that was what I must have had. When they saw it was a black lab, I’m sure they were as taken aback as I was that first time. It wasn’t a bark in the normal sense. It was literally a damn howl. He never actually barked. I can’t say I ever once heard him bark at a human—only at squirrels.

My sweet boy loved to chase the damn squirrels, racing them down the fence line with such speed and jumping up after them. Most of the squirrels learned to stay out of the yard. Two found out the hard way. Squirrels were pretty much what he reserved that howl for.

When excited—which didn’t take much—he would dance around in circles. It was one of the cutest things to witness. When he first started doing it as a puppy, I thought for sure he would grow out of it, but he never did. On his last day, he still danced around in his little circle.

My God, he was terrified of everything. You bring a balloon into the house, and he would make sure to be on the opposite side of the property. He was especially fearful of that monstrous vacuum cleaner, always wary of its usage around the house. One would have thought he had been abused by it, but no. It was just Owen being his cowardly self.

On that note, Owen never met a person he didn’t like. He was a trusting boy. He also never met another dog or cat he didn’t like. I remember how my dearly departed cat Samson would groom Owen. God, he loved to be licked by that cat. He also had his friends—my mother’s dogs. I wish he had been able to see them more often.

I can’t talk about Owen without mentioning his gas. He could clear a room with it. It was the worst. This is not a surprise, considering he ate just about anything you placed in front of him. It was atrocious. The definition of a dog fart: silent but deadly. I’ll save you all from talking about his stools. My God, they were massive.

Owen loved car rides with his head out the window. He just looked so at peace. It didn’t matter where we might be going; he was happy to go anywhere. I was happy I was able to bring him on one last ride. It was the last thing I was able to give him.

One of the funniest things about him was the stare, which felt like judgment—like he was gazing into your soul. I have so many pictures of that stare. I’d be on the couch watching a movie, and he would just sit and stare at me. I told him that it was rude to stare, but he never seemed to learn. I could make a collage out of all the pictures I have of him staring at me.

Owen is gone now.

God, the things I will miss about my boy, and the things I wish I could have given him more of. I know I gave him a good life and a good home.

I feel a great emptiness inside me. He was a part of our house. He was a part of my heart. I will always miss him, and it pains me very much to even write this blog. I’ve had to stop numerous times because of the tears streaming down my face. My sweet Oh-e Bear.

The remaining week was hard. At times I found myself just lost in space. I stared at nothing. My mind was beyond the material world. I had no focus. I would randomly have to leave the room because tears would start welling up. I drove around crying and screaming. I figured it best to go to work; at least it would act as a distraction from the pain.

My mornings were so off. I never realized how important he was in getting me out of bed. As soon as my alarm went off, he was up and moving around. There was no way of ignoring him. I always believed he was a little autistic, so routine was very important to him. I don’t think he exactly needed to go outside in the morning to pee or poop; it was just what he knew. Routine. He was a morning dog—the only critter in the house happy and excited to be awake. That made a major difference in my day, as I have now found out. I needed that urgency in the mornings.

I could also tell a difference in the other dogs in the house. Hazel and Rosco seemed sad as well. Hazel only knew three years of her life without her brother. What must she think? I came home, took Owen with me, and he never returned. How sad that is to think about. Does she know? I hate just thinking about it. I watched her the next morning while feeding them. For seven years she had tried to get into his food while he was eating, and out of habit she tried again, only to find Owen wasn’t there, and neither was his bowl.

How does a dog grieve? Do they? I think so. Hazel has been extra needy, and I have been willing to give her all the attention that she requires. I even gave her a spa day. My poor girl. How will she take not having Owen in her life? It worries me with her age. She has Rosco, but they are not close like she and Owen were.

I suppose we grieve together. Right now, I need her as much as she needs me. It’s just so new, this loss.